Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

JDaniel4s Mom

growing & learning with him

Deirdre Smith writes/owns JDaniel4’s Mom. After twenty years as a elementary school and technology resource teacher in Northern Virginia, she became a stay at home mom in upstate South Carolina. Her blog features ways she and her 5 year old are exploring learning, crafting, creating healthy meals and living life to its fullest. Deirdre can also be found on twitter as @jdaniel4smom and on her blog's FB page. You can also check her out on Google+.

Great Posts I Came Across This Week- June 12

By

Each week I travel around the internet visiting blogs. Here are a few posts that I loved, learned from, or gave me great ideas:
Child Related:
Havin’ Fun Yet has a fun clothes pin idea for counting called Clothespins. This would be a easy counting tool to put together. I bet you have all the things you need to make it at home.
Monkey See Monkey Do has a wonderful idea for making shadows with potato chip lids. She tells you how to create it in her post The Lion and the Mouse and Some Shadow Fun.
I am still looking for ways to use all those plastic Easter Eggs I gathered a few months ago. I found a fun idea on Child Central Station called Easter Egg Caterpillars.

The Picky Apple did an wonderful Gardening Sensory Bin. I think JDaniel would love to have one of these.

Recipes:
5 minutes just for me has a wonderful recipe for Ugly Cookies. These look great!
Mom Related Post:
Amaria’s Blog has a wonderful post on her daughter composing her first musical piece. The post is called Make a Joyful Noise to the Lord.
I Needed to Read This:
Totally Tots had a wonderful post called Intentional. It really reminded me that if I want JDaniel to understand God’s good news. I needed to act like it was good news.
Connecting with Other Bloggers:
Muffin Tin Mom is having a Muffin Tin Monday Swap 2010. This looks like a lot of fun.
Mariann Johansen Ellis is giving away a set of her bird prints. All you have to do is leave a comment. I love her work.

Bug Books and Other Bug Related Activities

By

We loved working with bugs this week. JDaniel has been so into trains and construction equipment. Bugs were a great diversion.
Books
The links below are affiliate links.
We read two bug-related books this week:

The Very Greedy Bee by Steve Smallman is about a bee that decides not to share a wonderful field of flowers he has found with his other hive mates. He eats it all himself and grows to big to fly. He needs the help of other insects to make it home. This book has a great lesson on sharing and helping others.


The Delicious Bug by Janet Perlman is also a book on sharing. The two lizards on the cover both catch the same bug. Neither one wants to let go of the plump bumble bug. They have an argument with their tongues out that takes them all around the pond they live near. The lizards have to learn to share and how to apologize to their neighbors for their rude behavior.

Language
JDaniel was asked to select a letter and put it in a construction paper hive. He preferred to put them in his dump truck.

The printout for the hive came from First School. The letter bees came from Toddler Toddler.
Math
We used an old juice bottle a bee hive to place the correct number of bugs in and later dump them out.



We made a bug out of two take-home boxes from Cracker Barrel. We went to Cracker Barrel while visiting with my mother-in-law this week.

Music
THE BUGS ARE MARCHING INTO TOWN
Tune: “When Johnny Comes Marching Home Again”
The bugs are marching into town, hooray! Hooray!
The bugs are in a great big Bug Parade.
Some are black and some are red.
Some have antennae on their heads.
Oh, we’re oh so glad the bugs could come today.
Jean Warren
The song was taken from Preschool Express.

Useless Unless Usual Understanding of Use Comes to Mind

By

My husband had been single and living in our house for over twelve years when we got married. There were interesting pieces of shall we call it “nostalgia” tucked in nooks and crannies all over the house. We believe somehow in rush to clean a bedroom that had a lot of nostalgia in it I might have discarded the remote control to a robot dog. After that, we came to an agreement that if I found something that I wasn’t sure we needed to keep, I needed to check with him first.
After being married a few months I found this lovely large plastic bug in a bedside table drawer. I am not sure of how or why it came to live at our house. I returned it to the drawer and left to discuss at a later date. It remained in the drawer for quite a while before I remember we had it.
Now that JDaniel is two this large bug has many uses. It can play hide and seek around the house. The bug makes a great pointer when JDaniel is asked to locate a letter in a puzzle or a picture in an I Spy book.

If you need to stop a train coming down a track, he can do that too.


 

 

Birds Need a Good Book and Bugs

By

We went to Barnes and Nobel last Saturday night and saw three bird nests tucked into this Barnes and Noble sign. I didn’t have my camera that night. JDaniel and I went back on Tuesday morning so I could take these shots.

The birds kept flying around the shopping plaza looking for bugs for their families.

 

Ways My Toddler is Like a Bug

By

You know your toddler is like a spider if he tries to climb everything.

Yes, everything is a piece of climbing equipment. The outside of the stairs become something to scale. JDaniel saw his friend Jake do this and has tried to do it for months. He has tried to climb a tree. He wasn’t sure how to make it up a tree. JDaniel just clung to a branch and said he was climbing. The crib is something many toddlers learn to climb out of. JDaniel has raised one leg to the top of his crib, but didn’t know what to do next. I am not going to teach him.

You know your toddler is like a mosquito if he learns to make loud sucking noises on your arms.

I love to blow on JDaniel’s tummy when I change his diaper and make a loud air horn noise. JDaniel decided to start doing the same thing to my arm early last week. I thought he was trying to bite me a first, but it turns out he just didn’t know what to do with his teeth.

You know your toddler is like an ant when he can carry things that seem to weigh more than he does.

Maybe not his full weight but heavy objects seem to be moving around my house. I don’t think my husband and I moved them.

You know your toddler is like a moth when he can’t get close enough to lights.

JDaniel loves flashlights. My mom has one out near her front door and he can’t wait to light it up. He also loves to climb up on the couch in the living room and turn out the lamp beside the couch. JDaniel really loves to do it if you are reading and he wants you to play.

You know your toddler is like an earthworm when he can’t get enough dirt on his hand, clothes, face, or toys.

We haven’t spent a lot of time outside lately due to JDaniel’s allergies. When we were outside a lot earlier in the spring, JDaniel was carrying his plastic spade everywhere and using it to dig in the mulch and dirt.

Finally you know your toddler is like a caterpillar when he can inhale lots of foods and later wants to cocoon himself your arms to snuggle.

Great Posts I Came Across This Week: June 5

By


Each week I travel around the internet visiting blogs. Here are a few posts that I loved, learned from, or gave me great ideas:

Child Related Posts:

My friend Valerie introduced me to babalisme’s post of Fairy Tale Paper Dolls. These would be great to have on a road trip this summer.

Mozi Esme’s Tot School post on Goats and Bridges has given me great ideas of activities to do with JDaniel. He is really into bridges right now.

The Pumpkin Patch has a post called Messy Monday: DYI Puff Paint Art. This looks like a lot of fun.

The Home Teacher has great post called Happy Trails that includes a scavenger hunt sheet you can take on your hike.

Recipes:

Gourmet Mom on-the-Go had two great posts I found this week. The first is called Mom?! There’s something in my dinner. I guess they didn’t like their dinner’s big monster eyes. The second post was mentioned by Steph and Randy in their Muffin Tin entry this week. It is called Peter Rabbit’s Garden Snack.

Macaroni and Cheese has a wonderful recipe for Sugar Cakes: The Best Sugar Cookie Ever (This year). They have a caramel icing that looks amazing.

I Needed to Read That Posts:

Mommy of a Monster( I Mean Toddler) and Infant Twins wrote a great post called Cuz I Gotta Have Faith.

Life of a Mom Post:

The Practical Mom Guide explains how she uses her interest in archeology today in a post called Archeologist Mommy.

An Ordinary Mom invited people to join her in reading a proverb a day in her post called A Proverb A Day Keeps the Foolishness Away. I joined her in the journey.

JDaniel’s Memorial Book (Baby Book) is Empty!

By

I was given a beautiful baby book when JDaniel was born as a gift. I put it on a shelf to work on later. Well, he is now two and three months and it is still empty.

There are slips of paper with his weight and height from doctor’s visits that could be recorded. Pictures are on the computer that could be printed out. Lists of gifts I was given at various showers. I just don’t seem motivated to get started.
Recently I unearthed my baby book. My mom meticulously recorded every detail of my babyhood in it. If I am honest I haven’t looked at that book in years. The birthday cards from when I was one just don’t hold meaning for me. I don’t know most of the people listed at gift givers at the baby shower that was thrown for me.

Lately I find myself wondering it my little guy will read through his baby book in the future if I can get my act together. I have a photo album of his first year he loves to flip through and have me tell him about.
I guess if it is weighing on my mind I should work on it. Some day his future wife might want to see it. She may not understand how an only child didn’t end up with one. I don’t want her to think I didn’t care.

Memorial Day Book and Craft

By

The link above is an affiliate link.
This week JDaniel and I read the book Memorial Day Suprise by Theresa Martin Golding. It is a really fun story that talks about a young boy learning about Memorial Day, parades, and the fact that his grandfather is a war hero.

JDaniel and I made a Memorial Day musical shaker to parade around the house with. I stapled the stars around two paper plates that were filled with dried pasta. JDaniel added the stickers.

We really enjoyed marching around the house with his shaker as we had our own parade.

Thanks to Troops and Their Families

By

I am so thankful for all those troops and their families that sacrifice every day for our country. Whether you agree they should be where they are or not, you have to acknowledge that they are giving a lot.
When I watch the troops returning from a tour or mission on television, I can see the joy that they have in being home. You can see the bliss their loved ones have in having them come home. I have read many blog entries in the past few months by wives who have had their spouses return. They write with such gladness about their husbands’ returns.
I have also read several great posts about how families have worked at staying in contact with their loved ones. Some have had their spouses record stories on videos that their children can watch. Others have sent special foods they know their loved ones enjoy. (One mom wrote about trying to send her son a pie. It took many months to get to him. I am not sure why.)
I know firsthand it can be hard to have a loved one far away. My sister Kate had a tour in Iraq. Thankfully it was a short tour. She was only gone for several months. The family was able to come and stay with her husband part of the time to help with her children. We were able to have many family members create birthday cards to send to her to celebrate her 40th. Thankfully she was on a base there the whole time.
There are many of you who have loved ones out in the field. They are asked to take risks every day. I can’t imagine how difficult it is for them or for you. Military families have so much to take on without their loved ones here. I don’t know how children grasp it. There are holidays, birthday and anniversaries that you have to be apart. I don’t know how you deal with all that you have to.
I do know that I am thankful to you and your family members far away. I hold you in my prayers!

 

 

Categories

memberships

From the Past